


family portrait (with a burned out hole)

by Yangs Sunglasses (Nilenium)



Category: Dororo (Anime 2019)
Genre: Daigo Family, Family Issues, Gen, Nui's POV, written before final ep
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-23
Updated: 2019-06-23
Packaged: 2020-05-18 11:58:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,418
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19334080
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nilenium/pseuds/Yangs%20Sunglasses
Summary: Tahomaru was almost five when it happened. The dreaded question.“Mother, could I have a brother?”Nui no kata dropped her chopsticks.





	family portrait (with a burned out hole)

Tahomaru was almost five when it happened. The dreaded question.

“Mother, could I have a brother?”

Nui no kata dropped her chopsticks, the height of inelegance. She quickly picked them up and took a few deeper breaths to calm her racing heart.

She glanced at her son, who was waiting for her answer with an impatient look on his little, innocent face. Tahomaru was so big already, she should have expected he would ask for such a thing. She shot a quick look at Kagemitsu. His own expression was completely inscrutable as he continued eating his rice and smoked fish methodically. He acted as if he’d heard nothing of importance and for a second she felt a flash of white-hot anger that he was so unaffected, unlike her. She smothered that feeling before it could take root. Her duty was to be the lady of Daigo, not to question her lord husband. Those hidden thoughts she was harboring were completely unbecoming of her station.

Still, some bitterness must have remained at the bottom of her heart.

“That decision belongs to your father, Tahomaru,” she said in deference, despite knowing full well what his answer would be. But she wanted him to be the one who told it to their son.

Kagemitsu narrowed his eyes at her as he realized her play, but she pretended not to notice as she lowered her gaze demurely. She got the clear impression that he did not approve of her drawing him into this conversation, but she couldn’t bring herself to care much.

Let him be the crusher of their child’s dreams.

“Then, Father, could I have a brother?” Tahomaru repeated his request, his round eyes shining hopefully.

Kagemitsu hummed, as if deliberating. “Tahomaru, why would you want one?”

“So he’d play swords with me! And we could go on adventures together! We’d protect everyone in the domain, just like you do, Father!” Tahomaru explained, full of childish excitement and with stars in his eyes. Like any boy his age, he idolized his father. Nui worried that he worshipped Kagemitsu a little too much, but there was nothing she could do to curb it.

“I see…” Kagemitsu nodded, smiling indulgently. “If we got you a brother, he’d be a baby. Will you wait for him to grow old enough to play and go on adventures with you?” he asked slyly.

“Wait? How long?” Tahomaru was taken aback.

“Five years at the very least,” Kagemitsu told him seriously.

“Five!” Tahomaru gasped. “Father, that’s as long as I’m alive! It’s very, very long!”

“Brothers don’t grow on trees, my son. They need a long time. Do you still want one?”

The little boy scrunched up his little face adorably as he thought through this conundrum. Then he shook his head with an air of sadness. “No, Father. I can’t wait that long. Thank you.”

Nui discreetly breathed out in relief. For a moment, she was afraid that if Tahomaru persisted in his wish for a brother, Kagemitsu would give in. Sometimes, he liked to spoil the boy. In her unkind moments, she thought he did it deliberately to cultivate his son’s hero-worship of him, not out of simple father’s love towards his only son.

In reality, the second son.

Nui swallowed, overwhelmed by a surge of sadness. She did her duty as the lord’s wife and the lady of Daigo. She bore her husband two sons – a sacrifice to the demons and a heir to the domain. Since then, his night visits to her bedroom had become rare. She was relieved this arrangement would not be changed.

Whenever she looked at Tahomaru, she wondered what Hyakkimaru would look like had he lived. What would he be like if he wasn’t sacrificed, if he wasn’t taken from her arms and thrown into a river to drown in the same hour he was born? It killed her that she’d never know.

Tahomaru could have had the brother he wanted. A good older brother that would gladly play with him and shield him from his father’s influence.

Hyakkimaru… Losing him was the biggest regret of her life.

Nui squeezed her eyes shut, twisting the fabric of her sleeve between her fingers as she fought through the wave of grief crashing into her. She finished her meal in silence, then excused herself from the table and went to pray to the headless statue of the Goddess of Mercy. Her lost son deserved all her prayers. There was nothing else she could give him as his mother.

When she kneeled before the statue, she briefly thought how grateful she was that Tahomaru lived without that cursed knowledge. He knew nothing of demon deals or his dead brother. She wished her second son would remain ignorant of the various cruelties of the world for a long time. But with a father like Kagemitsu, she feared that would not be possible.

Nui clasped her hands and prayed for Hyakkimaru’s soul. Even if it brought her only pain and suffering, she would continue to pick at this open wound he left in her heart and make it bleed every day. Time would never heal it. She would always remember her firstborn son. This was her duty as a mother, the heaviest of them all.

Not long after Tahomaru had made his uncomfortable request for a brother, Lord Daigo went out to war, defending their domain. As expected, the campaign was successful. Nui didn’t concern herself with his fate, sure that he would safely return thanks to the demon pact protecting him from all harm.

However, she didn’t expect that he would bring something home with him.

Kagemitsu instructed her to come with Tahomaru to the courtyard. When they got there, he was already waiting, and to her surprise, he had two young children with him, a boy and a girl. She carefully took in their thin frames and numb looks.

“This is Mutsu and Hyogo. They will stay here from today on. They will study and train with you,” he introduced them to Tahomaru with a pleased glint in his eye.

Nui remained impassive even as she understood her husband’s intention. She watched Tahomaru greet these grim-faced, dead-eyed children and drag them off to play. When they were gone, she finally spoke.

“Who are they, really?”

“They’re war orphans. I rescued them from captivity. They will be good companions to Tahomaru,” Kagemitsu explained.

Nui nodded thoughtfully and crossed her arms, hiding hands in her big sleeves.

“You don’t approve, my wife?” he asked.

She angled her face to the side, looked at the pine tree. “No. I’m certain they will be no trouble.” Then she glanced at him through lowered eyelashes. “I simply know what you’re doing.”

“Oh?” He raised an eyebrow at her. “What am I doing, then?”

“Tahomaru asked for a brother, but you gave him those two instead. You think they will replace his true brother in his life.”

“My son never had a brother,” her husband stated coldly, all traces of humour gone from his face that had become as rigid as stone. “And I never had a son other than Tahomaru. Is that understood, wife?”

Nui shuddered and held herself tighter. “ _I_ had a son. He was taken from me,” she said quietly. “But I won’t forget him. I won’t replace Hyakkimaru,” she added louder, giving him a defiant look.

“Be silent, woman!” Kagemitsu barked at her sharply as he grabbed her shoulders. “ _That thing_ wasn’t human,” he spat out with contempt, looking her straight in the eye. “Do not speak that name in my house again.”

Nui gave a stiff nod. After a few seconds passed, Kagemitsu released her. She rubbed at her shoulders, sure that she’d find finger-shaped bruises there when she would change for sleep this evening.

“Please, excuse me,” she murmured, passing by him.

She went straight to the headless statue and lost herself in the same prayer she had repeated thousands of times.

.

Ten years later, the Goddess of Mercy finally smiled upon a grieving mother and gave her a true miracle. Hyakkimaru was alive. Her lost, beloved son returned.

But his very existence threatened the peace of stability of their land.

And so, Kagemitsu ordered him killed and Tahomaru, the spitting image of his father, the same boy who wanted nothing more than a brother to play swords with, now set out to fight him to the death.

And Nui of conflicted loyalties was forced to watch her family tear itself apart.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! This is my first fic for Dororo fandom. I hope I'll be able to write more.
> 
> This fic was initially supposed to be about Tahomaru, but Nui completely took over and this is the end result. I hope you enjoyed it.
> 
> Please let me know your thoughts about the story! :)


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